Porting portage to OS X is a very clever move, there's currently no update utility that comes even close if you want to benefit from both the ability of checking out different versions of an application and compiling from source. That's what sets it aside from the Fink, which is essentially from the Debian/dpkg/apt-get realm, if I'm not mistaken. We do agree that portage can do better than that, right?

does anybody know what this means apart from having portage available on OSX (which sounds kinda good, but there already is fink)?

While Fink is a decent app and goes above and beyond its heritage (i.e. Debian's dpkg/apt) with some decent source compilation features, it's still lacking as compared to Portage. In this weblog entry I mentioned two of the nicest features of Portage are its USE flags and the ability to specify a processor arch. Fink and DarwinPorts both build with G3 processors in mind. They also build everything but the kitchen sink into their packages. Portage allows not only for cleaner (read less feature-packed) builds, but builds that are optimized for my G4 processor (and AltiVec).

This is a great thing! I've been wanting Portage for Mac OS X since I first started using Gentoo Linux last December. I'm hoping I can contribute in some way to the project, maybe documentation

I have quite a few fink & darwinports packages on my ibook in OS X (it also dual boots with gentoo linux of course). but as soon as portage is available for OS X I'm jumping in with both feet. I will be removing every last vestige of fink and darwinports.

I had always thought of fink as kind of a kludge anyway. darwinports looked much nicer, but it is quite immature. the 'port' program has nothing on 'emerge' when it comes to features.

A similar thing on Windows would be a killer app for open source. OK, compiling wouldn't be necessary (as the whole OS underneath ...) and most win users wouldn't care, but a binary portage like app that has most opensource software incl description in it would be a great help to users and the best publicity for the community.
Just see it from a "normal users" point of view. One of the most common problems besides win crashing is to find appropriate software for their needs - even if they go out and buy it. Most don't even know that free software even exists.
Lately a friend of mine wanted me to burn a cd for him (drivers, tools ... - still on a modem that poor guy) and there was lots of space left, so I just burnt OpenOffice on it. He was VERY surprised that this was legal and I didn't get this from some dark corner of the web.

Now think of the benefit of a software that updates itself automatically and givbes an overview of all free software (incl drivers of the companies that allow), is searchable by cathegories and keywords, installs/removes automatically, tells whenever there are updates (VERY important for normal users - you woldn't believe how many problems I could solve in my neighbourhood by just updating drivers/installing patches) and oft course has a nice gui.

I might be wrong, but this should increase the use of free software more than just a little. What do you think?

Will it use ported code for stuff that usually needs glibc? I ran into that problem with Gentoo/BSD. Also, does this include baselayout? If so, i'd be interested as gentoo init is NOT portable._________________Aim:gsfgf0

I would set up portage on the box I'm using right now (G4 OS X), but unfortunately it belongs to my dad, who hates it when I tamper with his box. :)
Always blames me when something goes wrong.. :)_________________What if God smoked cannabis...
What do you mean with 'What if' ?

I've been in the market for a PowerBook and this is great. I tried Debian once but didn't care for the package manage system at all. My only computer right now is Gentoo on an x86 processor and I love portage. I won't be getting my PowerBook for a while, so I wouldn't be surprised if this were running at least in early stages by the time I was ready to install it, so I also wouldn't be surprised if I never install Fink at all._________________Excellent..

That seems to be the idea, which is just fine with me, as I really like most things about OS X and adding emerge to that will be great. Hmm.. how long until someone writes a front end to portage for OS X?_________________Excellent..

Hopefully the thing doesn't stop after OSX. Would be nice to have it on SunOS, HP-UX, etc.

Bye...

Dirk

Follow the gentooize another distro topic in tips and tricks, and just don't emerge baslayout at the end (it won't work). Also, i'm not sure if sandbox will work. It has worked fine for the few things i've emerged on my bsd box, but people keep saying it needs to be ported. If it doesn't just add DISABLE_SANDBOX=1 to make .conf._________________Aim:gsfgf0

I've been a Gentoo user for about 7 months now and I'm convinced it's the best. I've recently bought an apple computer so that it would support Logic Audio, my sequencer of choice. This announcement is great news to me! This laptop I have bought (12" powerbook) is faster than my work laptop (PII 400), but is currently not set up for doing work (programming java, apache, php, mysql). Oh how I long for shorter compile times with ant!

Seriously, OS X confuses the hell out of me. I know it was built for retards, but maybe that is the reason I find it so confusing. When I install things, I can't tell where they go, I'm not sure how to delete them. Of course I've only been using it for a week and I'm sure I'll get better, but it sure will be nice to have emerge there for me with the UNIX side of things.

Basically here's what I'm looking for portage to be able install for me, so I can be lazy:
* a decent terminal (what were they thinking?)
* jakarta ant
* jakarta tomcat
* mysql
* php 4.x
* Bitchx
* Bittlebee

No, that's not what I was complaining about. All I really want is color for emacs syntax highlighting and a nice monospaced font. Also it is a little pokey compared to say, xterm. Also, why doesn't the alt-option button do an ESC ? The normal ESC works but it's not as fast to hit.

Hell, I want portage for OS X soooo bad! I love kwrite for writing a little piece of code and pasting it into the Apple Project Builder (I hate the Make-file Stuff of KDevelop) for compiling. I use Fink now, but the performance on my iBook/700 is baaad. I hope Gentoo can fix that! Portage would also bring more/more up-to-date programs for OS X, I hope!

I'm surprised that anyone would wonder why portage on OSX is a good idea unless they haven't been fortunate enough to use portage extensively or haven't been forced to use fink. Portage is infinitely more mature and flexible than fink, particularly when it comes to selecting what parts of what packages you want to use. Add to that the fact that portage will bring along many, many more applications than fink offers and much quicker package development/updating, and it's pretty obvious that this is a SMART MOVE. Admitedly, having fink for package management has been better than nothing, but it just doesn't come close to offering what portage does.

To be honest, though, I don't really see why a metapkg aliiance is even needed. I'm almost positive that gentoo developers could have caught up with the other package systems and surpased them in no time without any help from the outside.